In this piece or should I say scientific work the artist builds a three arm one made to the exact dimensions of his right and made to fit as an extension. It was able to pinch, grasp, and turn the wrist like a hand can. It was used throughout most of his performances but due to the weight and gel used to handle the arm it made his real arm irritated and to heavy for everyday use. so now its only used as a performance piece.
I think this piece is crazy and very good. To build that and see something like that. Its like looking into the future especially since this was done in the 1980's. unfortunately it was heavy and couldnt be used everyday but it sure was a giant stepping stone.
In this piece by Knowbotic I am reviewing My Black Cat. 30 black balloons filled with helium hover freely in space(of the room). They are moved subtle by the osculating fan in the room. Audience is free to play with the 30 balloons in the room but on the back wall the words "Super_Extras Don't Move!" When the balloons are moved they have an audio system attached to them that creates them to say a variety of sound bites. My black cat is black My black cat is rebellious My black cat is not easy to control My black cat is not a variable My black cat is undefinable My black cat is irregular My black cat is illegal My black cat is never changing My black cat is inflexible My black cat is stubborn
When the audience comes in to the piece I think they are put at ease. They can touch the blackcats(Balloons) the viewers can be creative and be playful. But with closer observation you can see not all things are not what they seem. A net is mounted at the ceiling to keep the helium filled balloons from flowing away, The words on the back wall discourage you from touching anything, and the sounds the balloons make as they are moved. So it is open but also very restricted. Just like media we have today in the word open but always censored.
Dead in Iraq is a series of protest art. Joseph logs on to a game that is used to help/recruit for United States Army or Marines. Joseph posts the death of real men and women who have given their lives for the war effort. What's not known is if he is for the effort or against it. Is he trying to change young men and women's mind about joining or is he just showing respect.
I like the art itself very powerful. Players of the game have no idea if it is real or fake. Are the post actually the names of former living army personnel. I guess not knowing is the creepiest part about the whole thing. So kudos to Joseph Delappe for thinking of it.
Glenn was not kidding when he said it was small. It was pretty much like the gallery at cypress but this one was way better. There were only a few pieces of art on display but they were actually good. I can see why Glenn spoke so highly of it within his blog. Plus they gave free stuff! which is always a treat.
What was on view was...
Inner Space-Birds
Chico MacMurtrie
Using compressed air Chico creates objects that have the illusion that they are living objects. From a bird flapping its wings to the human body moving back and forth. This was truly a treat to behold.
By far my favorite were the flying birds. They flapped there wings ever so nicely. It was a small exhibit but it gave me a new perspective on things you can do with are with just inflatable balloons/material and some compressed air.
This was taken from an interview that Dr. Garfield Doutt did a few weeks ago.
Reporter: good evening america Nigel Clish here with a special report for you tonight on our very special guest tonight. He is the founder of A.P.L (Android Progressive Living) and is about to change life as we know it.
Good Evening Dr. Doutt
Doutt: Good evening Nigel
Reporter: Can you tell us a little about yourself?
Doutt: Certainly hmm, My name is Dr. Garfield Alexander Doutt. I am 52 years old. I am a happily married father with 2 children Garfield Junior and Laura. I started out at M.I.T studying under them until I received my Doctorate in Mechanical Engineering with a Minor in Electrical and Computer Science. I then moved to Korea working as a contractor work under KITECH for there construction of an anroid.
Reporter: Was this EvER-1
Doutt: Yes, it was. this by far was one of my favorites to work on. Of course when I landed in Korea the language barrier was intact but I took it as a challenge to learn the language.
reporter: Tell us about EvER-1
doutt: sure.... EvER-1 was my first real project it was officially revealed to the public in 2003 and is noted as being the first android that could sing.
reporter: wow surely this would be a fantastic feat for any group to accomplish what kept you going.
doutt: honestly just life at the time my girlfriend was pregnant with our first child and I needed to keep pushing to reach my goals.
reporter: what was your next project?
doutt: my next project was DER 01 which I think I did work for under IRL (Intelligent Robotics Lab) from Japan. They released DER 01 back in I want to say 2005-2006
reporter: blurry line?
doutt: compared to where I am now very blurry
reporter: well when did you decide to go out on your own
doutt: well in order to build any spectacle worth seeing or talking about you need money so I went to a source of mines and old friend if you will John Gates.
reporter: john gates?
doutt: yes the playboy himself. I went to john and asked if would be willing to finance a project I had been wanted to do. he obliged but only if he could keep 85% of the profit from the first project then decrease down to size of 35% afterwards
reported: that's quite a high price
doutt: i really didn't care I had faith in myself that everything would work out for the best.
reporter: apparently they did (laugh)
doutt: yea I guess so.
reporter: SO which project was this?
doutt: This project was code name Replicon later to be known as BAR1 which is also known as Bio Android Robotic 1.
reporter: yes we all remember unveiling of BAR1 it was an amazing push in the field of robotics. the amazing part was that you did this all alone
doutt: well I can't take all the credit I managed to keep in touch with a few of my classmates from MIT and asked if they would be willing to help me with build the robot.
reporter: I remember watching you in your suit and the robot actually moving with you on 1-2-1 movements
doutt: yes it was amazing first time ever seeing something like that.
reporter: what came after that?
doutt: well me and my team here at APL took a long period of time to release our next project.
reporter: why?
doutt: we were doing so much with this product everything had to be right.
reporter: what came to be?
doutt: my bread and butter Android 001
reporter: wow! was it that big of a deal to you?
doutt: yes it was. it was a big deal to all of us there at APL. we created the first surrogate android for mass production now everyone can have an android and everyone can be an android.
reporter: explain..
doutt: with this android you are the android you are put to sleep with the comfort of your home to be reawakened as your android. all of your 5 senses are intact you can smell, hear, touch, see, and taste.
reporter: wow when will this product be available to the public
doutt: the summer of next year.
reporter: great well thankyou dr. doutt alway a pleasure seeing you.
doutt: likewise. you have a goodnight
reporter: well this is Nigel Clish signing out goodnight
My name Doctor Garfield Alexander Doutt. I am the CEO of APL or Android Progressive Listening as it is known throughout. We handle customer care in the field of robotics. With our product the Android 001 we have created the first surrogate android. Yes, you can now travel the world from the safety and comfort of your own home. Where did I get such an idea well. I graduated with a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from M.I.T and from there I have worker with various companies to produce android who can do lots of things. I started off In Korea helping to create what is known as EvER-1. Soon after that project was completed I moved on to another project which I completed known as DER 01. Working on those two androids I gained a lot of experience and was ready to change the world. I combined with John Gates to produce what is know as the greatest achievement know to man, the Android 001.
Comet Morigi is a Japanese female second life artist. She threats her avatar as she does herself with precise realism. Her avatar has been known to even gesture while talking. This piece is a small section from a gallery called "Viewing Islands, from the Gallery by an Architect". I think this piece is really cool just by looking at the picture it makes you think like wow mountains, islands, and pretty much all of these beautiful landscapes are being displayed on a wall.
I wonder if there is a separate meaning behind the title for the piece. What does it mean. Does it mean don't stay inside and look at great pieces of art that nature has created from a tv screen or from a computer monitor, go and view it or does it mean something completely different? If it means the first ironic thing would be that the artist is choosing to live her life through a computer monitor right now. Makes you think.
By far the coolest looking thing ever. If concept cars were ever looking for a building block on wear to start on making a flying car/rv this should be it. I'd buy one most definitely. This artist goes by Mariko Mori. This art piece is called Wave UFO it is a sculptural object and viewer participatory installation that epitomizes Mariko Mori's ongoing exploration of the relationship between the individual and an interconnected cosmos. On the outside it's shaped like a drop of water and appears to hover off of the ground. Inside you are presented to a video that is mainly based upon the participants that are within the UFO. It uses our brainwaves to create imagery. This is a first that I've ever heard this done and only wish I could go see it to see what is actually being shown on the projection screens. Like is it mood or what? I would like to participate is all that I do know. Interesting the artist is trying to combine otherworldly concepts, as in she wants us to connect with different ways of thinking.
7th artist is Gracie Kendal, she is a second life artist and uses her work to put herself back together. She's overweight and uses her second life avatar to give herself a second life. Her art is based on spontaneity and change. In this piece its her real self and her second life counterpart posing in similar manners You can really get the since that she is enjoying herself loving her life now. I wonder if she felt the same way before she created Gracie Kendal.
"…I have found it difficult to be comfortable in my own skin. My sense of self has become dislodged and torn apart. Through Gracie I have begun to put myself back together.
By reading this qoute she wrote it's hard to tell. Was she an overweight artist who found comfort and herself within secondlife or is she just an artist looking for a new media to present work within. She threats Gracie as if she is real as if she is herself. Most interesting is one picture she has on her site.
In the real world you can't wish and make something happen but you can in second-life. So I think if you ask the question is Gracie Kendal real. I say no she's not. She is an alter-ego, but definitely not real.
Vaneeesa Blaylock is an interesting and mysterious individual. Born April 25th 1969 at Georgetown University Hospital. Her mother was a diplomat in the Reagan Administration. Graduated high school in 1987. She spent her 1987-1988 academic year at UCSD where she studied with Alan Kaprow. In 1988 she was recruited by The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts she agreed to go and spent. She graduated 1991 with a degree in choreography. She did graduate work at Koninklijk Conservatorium (Conservatory of the Hague). Which she felt out of place but was kept in good spirits by her music professor Louis Andriessen. She would go on to graduate with a MFA in New Media Studies in 1998.
Vaneeesa Blaylock is an performance artist within second life, her work deals with ideas of identity and individuality. She was officially born again April 11, 2009 in Little Andalucia. When I see her work im not sure what I feel or what to think. I don't know whether to say "oh this is great" or "it's been done". Going over her portfolio which took forever to find I was able to find some art work that was really easy to comment on.. This is her third art piece on Second-life called
"Veinticinco Mujeres"
This is "woman" naked, not "nude". Not as "god made her" but as she has chosen to exist in second life. I found this piece interesting since it is pretty much just a bunch of naked women standing. But it's women standing naturally how they want to be viewed. Not as the overweight divorced loser degenerate that everyone calls them. Just as they feel inside just as how they want to look. But then it got me thinking why are there only women. There's so many more people, so many more species on second-life why focus on one gender.
This one is called Prism, pretty basic no identity here just a prism might as well call the piece rainbow though minus the fact that it has more colors in it. When viewing her art I don't really see anything aspiring or different all I see is "ohh I wonder how you do that in second-life". There isn't really much of a bio about her anywhere or if she's even a her. All I have is a portfolio of her artworks that contains about 19 pieces. http://vaneeesa.com/portfolio/
Tony Oursler my final artist of the week is a video artist who does work similar to Gary Hill and Bill Viola. The art piece I am going to discuss now is going to be Tony Oursler "Vampiric Battle" Now before you jump ahead of me and say something about Twilight or True Blood or anything like that, stop yourself because it's not. Vampiric Battle is a metaphor for the battle we all do with ourselves to stay young stay beautiful. Vampires as we know technically don't age. We are all in a battle with ourselves to stay young. We use different things to stay young like botox, makeup, plastic surgery, expensive creams, etc. It's all an illusion of youth and fertility and the innate desire to attract a mate.
We open the video seeing 5 different faces hearing voiceovers from all of them some saying "that's attractive, don't you think that's attractive?" we then see a lady who's going through the procedure of getting marked up by a doctor before she goes under the knife for plastic surgery. We all have to be honest with ourselves and try not to hide what we are by using makeup or different things to try to "lie" to society and just embrace what we already have. In other words "BE YOURSELF!"
Joan Jonas
Vertical Roll Joan Jonas is a video artist, she sort of reminds me of Nam June Paik except she usually stays with the feminism as a subject for her works. The art piece that I am going to talk about today is going to be Vertical Roll by Joan Jonas. I must be honest this video is not aesthetically pleasing or easy to listen to, but it is truly a work of art. The video and audio within the piece all play a significant roll within the piece. Which is why you end up with a mechanical feeling while watching the piece. Vertical Roll is a very interesting piece indeed and from what I understand just by watching it it is suppose to be a visual of how men actually view women in society.In a few sequences Jonas is shot naked wearing two different masks. The masks have a done-up type look to them, with these fake smiles. Like many of the women in our culture, who will not leave their bedroom without "putting on their faces". The sequence where Jonas is dressed in a dancers' costume, which has a dominatrix look to it, the viewer gets to stare at various parts of her body as the camera zooms in to her torso, her lower back, chest, etc. The shots get repeated through the use of the vertical roll, emphasizing a male's fantasy of what a woman should look like. Jonas is not only wearing a skimpy outfit but she also happens to be a particularly thin woman; weight is just another issue consistently presented to women day in and day out in today's society. At the end of the tape, the viewer gets this eerie stare from Jonas herself; the face naked of any make-up as well as emotionless. The viewer gets the feeling that it is the woman finally getting to stare at and inspect the man. Only to have her head smashed by the vertical roll out of frame to just reveal a white back/empty frame.
Bryn Oh is a second life artist, he sketches out his work and then goes onto second life to recreate what he had already drawn to make beautiful works of art. The art piece I'm going to discuss this time around is going to be The Mayfly. The Mayfly is probably the 3rd piece I saw from him is the best one that I actually connected with. The Mayfly's life is quite poetic if you think about it hard enough. They live as larvae in the mud for about one year to grow as an adult to have the life span of only 30 minutes to 1 day. They are often reborn without mouths as they are just not needed since they have such a short lifespan. It's almost tragic to give them the ability to fly for such a short time.
Watching the video your presented a swamp you get to witness mayfly's being reborn to fly only to live a short time to die. You are also given a very beautiful word by word play of what is actually going on in poetic fashion of course. At the end of the video the last mayfly dies just as night demands. Crazy to see this all done on second life. What I also found intriguing about the video was that night is not present throughout the whole video but as it gets later in later in the day night gets closer as if death is near to take them away.
